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The Three-Body Problem
During China’s Cultural Revolution, the persecution of scientists shapes astrophysicist Ye Wenjie’s judgment of humanity and eventually connects her to a secret installation searching for extraterrestrial intelligence. Decades later, nanotechnology researcher Wang Miao encounters inexplicable experimental results, a disturbing countdown, and a virtual world governed by wildly unstable celestial cycles. His investigation—with the blunt, observant police officer Shi Qiang—reveals that these mysteries belong to a conflict extending far beyond Earth. The Three-Body Problem combines historical trauma, scientific investigation, conspiracy, and first-contact fiction. Its central threat is not simply the arrival of another civilization, but humanity’s divided response to that possibility. Some see extraterrestrial intervention as extinction; others welcome it as judgment or rescue. Through this division, Cixin Liu asks whether technological intelligence produces wisdom, whether despair can be…